Where to for Super Rugby?

[Jamie]

You are correct, anybody that thinks that a Aus National Comp only model will improve our standard of play is kidding themselves. We need to play the Kiwis and SA week and week out.

Everybody has to play each other (No matter how many teams in the comp) AND if the first 4 teams are Kiwi teams so be it, whatever team is in the top 4 at the end deserves their spot, period.

I love this game yet without the internal aspect of super rugby and I have very little interest I'm afraid. The quality of our game is poor, best game in the last few season was the Tahs vs Rebels game a couple of weeks ago... and we know where those teams sit in the table right now

The standard of coaching is really letting AUs rugby down at the moment, what are these coaches preaching?! and I'm talking across the board! not just head coaches. The Tahs are leaking tries and Nathan Grey is the defence coach of the Wallabies?!!! I was at the Tahs vs Saders game and the tackling was appalling and not only appalling players gave up chasing opposite players once beaten. The Brumbies are championing the maul?!!! Are these the same Brumbies of old?!!! They are so predictable that the Highlanders knew exactly what was going to happen in that last play! Is this the same Larkham that use to split teams apart?!

Rebels kick for goal at the very first chance they get! NO Rebels you are not going to win 3 - 0, The coach should be encouraging tries, god knows they only get a sniff of the try line in most games, take your chances!

At least the Force are trying, I don't buy the lack of depth and talent in this country, our skill level is crap and I blame the coaching staff, anybody that is not performing needs to be dropped, no more sacred cows.

Cutting one team will not make a difference unless we have better coaching staff

Last but not least NO MORE aimless kicking!!!! That means you Frisby, Stirzaker, Phipps, Horwitz, etc... AND if you are going to kick make sure that YOUR team knows the play!!! FFS make them chase and contest. Horwitz kicked the ball away in possession last Sunday and you could see the Saders try coming... what was Hortwitz doing? basically walking, that was his chase!

 

[Dan54]

But we always hear about how important it is for NZ and SA teams to play each other in the regular season so surely they'd both be quite happy for Australia to leave Super Rugby (or have its own closed regular season conference) while staying involved in TRC? You'd be able to have a lot more of those important NZ vs SA games.

Omar, I don't think anyone in their right minds think NZRU are saying that it is just important to play SA teams, but believe that playing Aus AND SA teams is preferable. I think the idea that everyone is against us mentality is starting to take over amongst Aus supporters. I think it is quite important for Aus players to get exposed to SA rugby as well, and would suspect that ARU do to, or they should!

 

[Joe King]

'We should play an Australia-only comp' or 'we should play in a trans-Tasman competition' just shows a limited understanding of the situation at hand. Half the point of Super Rugby and SANZAAR is the pooling of resources (read 'television contracts'). The small population of NZ, rugby being a niche sport in wealthy Australia and SA being between the two means that SA, NZ, and Aus are largely co-dependent in that respect.

A stand-alone Australian comp involving 5-6 teams would be of even lower quality than the current model, with fuckall interest from anyone (especially ex-pats). And looking at the current situation, do you honestly see any reasonable NZ fan going to the pub to watch a foregone conclusion against an Australian team in a trans-Tasman comp? I'm fairly sure that most kiwi rugby supporters consider SA to be their traditional rivals.

Also regarding rejigging a conference system - just can it. If it takes more than 30 seconds to read the explanation of a competition, people will just stop caring. Go back to round robin, best 6 or 8 teams make the finals. No 'we didn't play Canterbury this year' or 'they played the Cheetahs and Kings TWICE this season'. Just the best teams playing high pressure finals football.

You may be right in your other points, but I think there would be more interest in a stand-alone Oz comp from Ozzie fans, than there would be for Ozzie fans in Super Rugby. I may be proved wrong, but I don't think I am ATM.

 

[Omar Comin']

You would need to plan a reasonable way ahead before you did anything because your contracting arrangements would have to reflect that.

If your revenue and ability to pay players changes substantially then they'd need to look at stopping contracting players beyond a certain year at some point in time to be able to adjust to that new position.

If the revenue was going to drop substantially then they may also need to look at a new CBA. Overheads will go up rather than down if more domestic teams are added and if revenue drops, they might no longer be able to afford as high a percentage of player generated revenue.

All good points.

But overheads (for the ARU at least) wouldn't necessarily have to go up if more teams are added as those teams could be privately (or community) owned. And the costs of running such a competition (in terms of travel and accommodation in particular) would be significantly lower. The ARU should only distribute to the competition and each team what is appropriate and sustainable.

 

[Omar Comin']

Omar, I don't think anyone in their right minds think NZRU are saying that it is just important to play SA teams, but believe that playing Aus AND SA teams is preferable. I think the idea that everyone is against us mentality is starting to take over amongst Aus supporters. I think it is quite important for Aus players to get exposed to SA rugby as well, and would suspect that ARU do to, or they should!

Is it so important it's worth letting our teams be invisible for 15% of the season in our highly competitive sporting market? Is it worth us not being able to have any significant presence in many of our large population centres?

Why isn't it important for us to regularly play European club teams? Surely it would benefit our players even more if they played over in Europe for a couple of weeks in every season as it'd be great preparation for them if and when they get selected for a Spring tour. The Wallabies play 3 or 4 matches in Europe every year after all and only 1 match in South Africa.

 

[Omar Comin']

You are correct, anybody that thinks that a Aus National Comp only model will improve our standard of play is kidding themselves. We need to play the Kiwis and SA week and week out.

No one is saying it would improve our standard of play. Though if you're referring specifically to the Wallabies it might if we just picked the best players no matter where they are based.

What we're saying is it would help spread rugby throughout Australia by giving more people in more places a team to support that would play each weekend at a good time to watch against teams from places everyone knows and with players they recognise. You know, like every other sport that is doing well in this country.

 

[Jamie]

I see your point however we do have a National Comp and Club Rugby, plenty of options

Also if the standard of rugby will be in line to what our teams have been dishing out in the last few years I don't many people will be interested, just my opinion.

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

No one is saying it would improve our standard of play. Though if you're referring specifically to the Wallabies it might if we just picked the best players no matter where they are based.

What we're saying is it would help spread rugby throughout Australia by giving more people in more places a team to support that would play each weekend at a good time to watch against teams from places everyone knows and with players they recognise. You know, like every other sport that is doing well in this country.

It's essentially tailoring it for our market. A market that cares very little about how international a league is. That's what people need to get their heads around. The average punter really couldn't care less about a team from Johannesburg. But they will if it's NSW vs Qld or Melbourne vs Pertg etc.

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

I see your point however we do have a National Comp and Club Rugby, plenty of options

Also if the standard of rugby will be in line to what our teams have been dishing out in the last few years I don't many people will be interested, just my opinion.

I think we'd see more along the lines of the NRC standard. Maybe a little higher. At least to start. That's a pretty entertaining brand of Rugby. I tend to think many people are placing far, far too much emphasis on the overall competitiveness of the Wallabies as a jistification for staying in Super Rugby.

Look at our other sporting codes. Where are the Socceroos ranked? Does it matter for the health of Soccer that they ranked 47th in the world? Or is having a sustainable domestic league more beneficial for its growth long term? I'd say the latter more so than the former.

 

[Omar Comin']

Exactly and it's not like we'd be giving up the whole international element of rugby. The Wallabies would still play 12+ matches every year.

And we could still have some international teams in our competition - so long as they're in our time zone, competitive and not costing the ARU anything.

 

[Jamie]

Really? I could be wrong but every single of my rugby friends cares little or supports a National League all we want to watch is Super Rugby and Wallabies, we are all members Super Rugby members. There is a lot of sport to watch and if we want to watch national comps we watch NRL and AFL, however every single one of us will place Rugby as our 1 sports.

There was something great about this comp that has been lost and in my opinion adding an Argie and a Japanese teams were huge mistakes

We all agree that something needs to be done yet I don't think there was anything wrong when it was 15 teams (Aus, SA and NZ)

 

[Omar Comin']

I think we'd see more along the lines of the NRC standard. Maybe a little higher.

It'd definitely be a higher standard than the NRC as every player would be fully professional and teams would be allowed to contract a higher number of international imports. So for example, the best players from the ITM Cup and Currie Cup on the fringes of Super Rugby, good Argentinian players that don't have enough opportunities at home, players from the Islands etc. All of these sorts of players would get paid a hell of a lot more in a fully professional 20+ week Australian competition than playing semi-professionally, or as a fringe player in their own countries.

 

[Quick Hands]

It seems pretty clear that the NZRU's views around competition structure are primarily based on how to best prepare All Blacks and not about how to build a great competition in and of itself.

It doesn't really matter for them, they have 5 teams that cover all NZ's major population centres, and they have no competing sports that get anywhere near rugby's reach and quantity of local content.

Of course it's the opposite in Australia, where we have 5 and probably soon 4 teams that compete for hearts and minds against 18 AFL clubs, 16 NRL clubs, 10 A League clubs and others. Where we have just 1 team in both of our heartland states, that often go 3 weeks without a home game while the other sports have multiple games every weekend.

By giving up a team we're going to be giving up on rugby having a genuine presence in a big Australian market like Perth so that we can continue to give South Africa and New Zealand their optimal test preparation competition. There's not even a thought of expanding professional rugby's reach into places like Western Sydney, the Hunter and Central Coast regions, Queensland outside of Brisbane etc.

It's not working for Australian rugby and it's time to do something else.

As you rightly point out, NZRU are looking after their own interests in this matter - which is what you'd expect them to do. They have no duty or responsibility to protect or promote rugby in Australia (or anywhere else for that matter).

The ARU have the responsibility to protect and promote rugby in this country, and it doesn't take a genius to work out that the priorities of NZRU and ARU are completely different.

 

[Quick Hands]

Personal Observation of the change in this forum.

To suggest even 2 years ago Super Rugby was a broken system, would receive almost no support. To suggest an Australian only or Aust / NZ only competition received mostly negative comments.

Today even those arguing for a continuation of Super Rugby use lost revenue as the main reason. Which to me means most rugby fans actually want a end to Super Rugby as it is currently structured.

The elephant in the room in leaving Super Rugby is lost revenue.

I can't start a thread, but was wondering if someone could on how to structure and then fund an Australian and or Aust / NZ only competition because me thinks thats what people mostly want .

Except NZ seem not to want a trans-Tasman competition.

 

[RedsHappy]

Bob Dwyer openly calls for Pulver and the ARU board to all resign:

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/w...n/news-story/ffa9d6eebfa3aeca186a82a01ffc2fd5

 

[Quick Hands]

Really? I could be wrong but every single of my rugby friends cares little or supports a National League all we want to watch is Super Rugby and Wallabies, we are all members Super Rugby members. There is a lot of sport to watch and if we want to watch national comps we watch NRL and AFL, however every single one of us will place Rugby as our 1 sports.

There was something great about this comp that has been lost and in my opinion adding an Argie and a Japanese teams were huge mistakes

We all agree that something needs to be done yet I don't think there was anything wrong when it was 15 teams (Aus, SA and NZ)

I don't doubt what you and your friends want, but if TV ratings and media interest are anything to go by then you are in a small minority. As you point out, people who want to watch a national competition will watch NRL and AFL- which is exactly what the majority of viewers are doing.

The customer is always right, and at the moment people aren't buying what rugby is selling. We can either take that circumstance on board and adjust what we do and the way we do it, or we can battle on doing the same thing. One of those options will achieve a different result (either better or worse admittedly) and one of those options will achieve the same result (continuous, unrelenting decline)

 

[Quick Hands]

Bob Dwyer openly calls for Pulver and the ARU board to all resign:

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/w...n/news-story/ffa9d6eebfa3aeca186a82a01ffc2fd5

Welcome to the revolution Bob.

I'm getting the vibe RH that we're going from being voices in the wilderness, dismissed as a noisy minority to holding the majority view. I suspect it's slowly starting to dawn on people how poorly led the game has been and that rugby doesn't possess a unique uniqueness which separates us from the rest of the sporting norms .

 

[Micheal]

Bob Dwyer openly calls for Pulver and the ARU board to all resign:

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/w...n/news-story/ffa9d6eebfa3aeca186a82a01ffc2fd5

Fuck me Bob Dwyer is a hack.

How would that help anything?

Yep, lets get another CEO and ~10 board members, spend the next 12 months getting them up to speed on where the game is only for them to achieve the exact same results because, like it or not, theres not much more the ARU can actually do to improve the state of the game short of throwing a hail mary which could, in actuality, completely fuck it over.

Pulver's doing a good job. His two biggest points of contention have been his handling of the Beale-McKenzie saga, but I have no quarrels with that, and his handling of this SANZAAR negotiation, which even I think has been sloppy.

I guarantee you that if we replaced Pulver we'd be calling for his replacements head in 12 months time.

 

[lou75]

Really? I could be wrong but every single of my rugby friends cares little or supports a National League all we want to watch is Super Rugby and Wallabies, we are all members Super Rugby members. There is a lot of sport to watch and if we want to watch national comps we watch NRL and AFL, however every single one of us will place Rugby as our 1 sports.

There was something great about this comp that has been lost and in my opinion adding an Argie and a Japanese teams were huge mistakes

We all agree that something needs to be done yet I don't think there was anything wrong when it was 15 teams (Aus, SA and NZ)

agree with this.
On the last point, I think they invited Japan in for their money and I thought they should have two teams in the comp so they have a home and away game each week to give their fans time to build the base, even if their home game is played at times in Singapore, and no Argentina for time reasons

 

[Quick Hands]

Pulver's doing a good job.

Depends how low you set the bar.